Meaning on the Sign Posts
Yesterday morning walking the dogs with L, we decided to take a longer walk through City Park and coming out the front we came face to face with almost instant death. A large black truck slammed through a red light and came a breath away from crashing into me, L and our five dogs combined. Luckily the truck swerved to the right as hard as it could and missed us. But we all stood there in shock processing what might have just happened – even the other cars around us stopped moving and became paralyzed by the thought of what could have been.
L and I went into Cabrini and I held the Bean so she wouldn’t chase the ball, but when the ball wasn’t in play and I took her off the leash she dashed out for a long throw as if the ball was going to be thrown and I couldn’t catch her to quit her full steam running. After she was spent and woolly from having exerted herself and I paced her slow on the way back to the Can so as to not incur any episodes. She is really exertion intolerant.
Even though my arm is still very sore, I went to the gym to do weights and M was there and told me after feeling my elbow down my arm that I had definitely stretched a tendon and that it just needs rest and stretching so I used little bitty girly weights and felt silly with the pink weights in my hand when I am so used to lifting heavy. L came to the gym and we followed each other to Whole Foods which has reopened uptown. It was good people watching as much as grocery making. LoLo’s is gone, now an empty lot, after being torn down. And out front were pens with ragamuffin puppies that some shelter had set up hoping for adoptions. I wanted to take all the puppies home, but Arlene is what kept me from doing so. She needs rest when she’s home, not a puppy chewing on her ears.
The St Patty’s parade spectators had already staked their claim along Magazine and I thought about calling G and going for some green beer but then opted not to. I picked up my Mardi Gras photos and there was some from W’s last visit with me – where he took off center photos of me and some of the Bean and then I took one of him – hand on hip. He looks 12 years old in the picture. Later, went out in my new red shoes and had sushi at Wasabi. While we were there we ran into old friends who had just come back to NO weeks ago – they had evacuated to some farm up in Pennsylvania and had the air about them of the newly arrived. Upon returning she had lost her job – another ding. Their house had taken less than a foot of water but because it had sat with that water mold had eaten up the entire contents. They talked about driving out in Lakeview and seeing friends’ homes ruined. They hadn’t been to the 9th ward yet. They were half giddy, half depressed, and 9 parts in shock.
We left Wasabi and walked over to the Bank for a cocktail and had just situated ourselves at the bar when L thought he recognized someone there he didn’t want to see and we made a quick exit. After that I came back to the Can and began watching “What the Bleep do we know!?” a mix of quantum physics and reality perception quirky movie. I dreamed a lot of W – all fun and happy dreams. I heard his voice clearly in the dreams, so much so that when I woke this morning I felt like I had spent the evening with him since the interactions were so realistic and his voice so clear.
When I walked the dogs along the bayou this morning – Renny shedding like a persian cat – L and I talked a little about what the hell quantum physics really is – I was thinking it was that in order to know matter it had to interact with other matter – which seemed to be the thrust of the movie that we create our own reality because whatever we know we interact with – but L seemed to think it sounded more like existentialism in that we create our reality through action and interpretation. Quantum physics is simplistically called the physics of the incredibly small. We talked about happiness coming from within rather than external – but couldn’t come to any conclusion about what that really means – we can both say we are content – but what does it really mean that happiness is within us and not derived from the external? S would say in a negative tone that I keep looking outside of myself for happiness – and I would say in a positive vein that I am a seeker of all things – experience, knowledge, interactions – and am thirsty for what the world has to offer. But then again I think I am more the existentialist and he definitely the rationalist. And these philosophies are fundamentally opposed to each other.